NBC’s ‘The Playboy Club’ Pilot Stirs Controversy Over Nudity

NEW YORK — The NBC series “The Playboy Club” hasn’t even aired yet and is already creating controversy over a nudity clause the actors signed in their contracts.

Variety magazine said that the stipulation is unheard of for broadcast TV, but it’s believed that the clause is intended for domestic and foreign cable syndication.

Industry insiders said there is no nudity in the pilot episode and that there are no plans to include nudity if picked up for a series run. If there was a scene that involved nudity, the actors would be able to approve or decline it.

Meanwhile, the TV watchdog group the Parents Television Council is taking shots at the network over the nudity clause saying the Comcast/NBC merger is trying to “obliterate any remaining standards of broadcast decency.”

During last year’s public comment period for the merger, Tim Winter, the group’s president called on the Federal Communications Commission to “force Comcast to stipulate that it absolutely will not use the public airwaves to distribute pornographic material.”

The drama pilot for the 2011–2012 season centers around Playboy bunnies in the 1960s amid political and moral changes of the decade.